Such life can never escape from God, its source. It may be that rationalism is the foster child of reformation, but in due season a spiritual faith is born of rationalism itself. The power men seek in the religion and education of the churches is ever the mighty power of an endlessly enlarging life. This, then, is my single contention, that the aim of religious education, in our day, is to deal with all the material that comes to hand from all the universe of knowledge and revelation, and so to present and interpret it, according to the wisest pedagogical methods, as to produce life in individuals by bringing them into conscious and believing action as in the presence of Him" in whom we live and move and have our being." THE EDUCATIONAL AIMS OF THE PASTOR THE PASTOR AS TEACHER REV. EVERETT D. BURR, D.D. PASTOR FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, NEWTON CENTER, MASSACHUSETTS I venture to suggest some definite ways in which the pastor may render valuable service as a teacher. First of all, as the teacher of teachers. It is easier to criticise the inefficiency of modern Sunday school teachers than it is to provide those who can do any better. The young men and women of our churches who are enrolled in the teaching force of our Sunday schools are doing the best they know how to do. They are to be congratulated, not criticised; praised, not ridiculed. They cannot go to a school of pedagogy; they cannot master the treatises upon the subject. To offer them a recent volume on psychology would be to dishearten them, yet they are being told by ardent and eloquent speakers at Sunday school conventions that unless their teaching accords with modern pedagogical and psychological methods they are really doing harm to the souls of their children. They become discouraged, grieve over their lack of preparedness for so serious responsibilties, and not infrequently give up their tasks. The more conscientious, earnest, and intelligent of the teachers are the most sensitive to their own inadequacy. A pastor's class for teacher-training will meet such a condition and supply the need. Here the simple, fundamental laws of mind may be explained in a friendly, informal way. The more effective methods of presenting truth may be talked over, the thought method and the teaching method of Jesus and Paul may be learned by a new and interesting study of the New Testament. The literary and historical method of Bible-study may be explained and the illumining discoveries of recent research presented. Into such a class may be gathered not only those who are already teaching, but those also who might be available for such service. Call it a Biblical Research Club, call it a Normal Class, call it a Teachers' Training Class, call it what you will, only let the result be gained that a group of people bent on understanding the Word of God and knowing how to teach it, shall meet under the competent leadership of their minister and engage in the endeavor. The mechanics of such a class meeting may be easily disposed of. A small contribution from each member of the group will provide a sufficient fund to make available the best periodicals in the varied departments of Bible-study. The members may be detailed for special work, or the class divided into smaller groups, who will look up matters of interest in exposition, excavation, in history or geography, criticism and interpretation respectively, or work away in the field of child-study, or teaching methods, and at each meeting new light will be brought, new interest awakened, new enthusiasm engendered, and the whole group enriched by the gifts of each. The meeting of such a class as this may well displace an ineffectual Sunday night service, or find a new place for itself in the midweek services, even at the sacrifice of some meeting of the older type, for such a class will generate power and make the teaching force of the church available and efficient. A second field for pastoral leadership is in missionary study. In the great majority of our churches the missionary work is relegated to the women of the church. And yet the great enterprise of missions expects to succeed by the offerings which prosperous, intelligent men will give through the church treasuries. It has been found perfectly practicable in one church to induce a large number of men to read missionary biography. In one single season three dozen men were pledged to read some thrilling life-story of a great missionary, and report his inspiration and impressions at a missionary concert. This is not a difficult task in any church. Let a missionary committee under the direction of the pastor, in laying out a series of missionary meetings for the church, plan to have half of them, at least, the presentation of the lives of as many noted missionaries. Each biography may be divided among five men, asked to read a few chapters and present a certain period of the life. Few men will refuse such a request. By such a simple and practical method the men of the church may be made enthusiastic for missions, new and hitherto unheard voices will bring new power to the public meetings, the whole church receive the impulse and the missionary treasuries a marked increase in offerings. A third field, even more promising than the other two, is among the children. It will readily be granted that our modern secondary schools do not impart a strong ethical impulse, nor give to our boys and girls the instruction in morals which they deeply need. The intellectual culture is ethically colorless. There is not time in the ordinary Sunday school session for such instruction, except as it may be incidental to the regular lesson. The homes are rare in which definite instruction in the great Christian principles of conduct is given. Where, then, shall our young mariners learn a true nautical code before they venture upon perilous seas, unless their ministers, whom they know and love, come to their aid? As to manifest results: (a) The opportunity such a class affords for personal, immediate, and friendly intercourse with the children. The hand of a friend most easily can lead another into the larger life. Such conversational hours naturally induce an understanding and frankness which the remote touch of the pulpit, or an occasional visit to the Sunday-school, can never accomplish. (b) The opportunity for co-operation with the home in influencing the spirit and temper of the children. How can ministers and parents get together any more readily than when their hearts are fused in the fires of a single interest? (c) The opportunity of really determining the moral code of a life and settling his standards of conduct. When a minister faces his congregation he is compelled to realize that his hearers are for the most part so mature that their mode of life is settled, their standards fixed, their principles and prejudices almost unalterable. He wonders whether anything he can say will effectively transform their lives. But he has no misgivings whatever when he teaches a class of children between the ages of ten and fifteen. (d) Such teaching will be more than ethical, because it is so Biblical and Christic. Confining the lessons to the very words of Jesus awakens a personal interest in Him. He seems so interested in child-life, to understand their needs so intimately, that the conviction arises that Jesus Christ is a child's best friend, and they come gradually to love Him, trust Him, and obey Him. The children grow in grace as they increase in wisdom, and so by a natural process of soul-culture under the influence of a present Christ they are saved from the necessity of a cataclysmic experience. Religion is seen to be a life, and its beginning and growth wrought in vital processes. May I add a brief word of explanation about the mechanics of such class-work? I have made and printed a lesson-slip each week, and given this to the members of the class, with a blank book and two fivecent Testaments, with the suggestion that they paste the lesson-slip upon a left-hand page, and after cutting the verses of the lesson from the Testaments, paste them on the opposite page, so that the children acquire a method of study and produce by their own labor a hand-book of Christic teaching which will be of lasting value to them. It is a gratifying incident in such simple devices that an appropriate employment is given to the Sunday afternoon hour and the "Pastor's Class-book" has proved a help to the solution of the problem of Sunday occupation for children. SOME OF THE LESSON-SLIPS USED BY THE Rev. Everett D. Burr, D.D., IN HIS "PASTOR'S CLASS" WHAT JESUS TEACHES ABOUT SPEECH Luke 11:37-40 John 8: 28, 38 12:49, 50 7:46 3. WHY AND WHEN DID JESUS REFUSE TO SPEAK? John 19:7-9 Matt. 26: 62, 63 Mark 15:3-5 Luke 23:8-11 John 7: 18 4. DID JESUS GIVE ANY DEFINITE STANDARD OF SPEECH? Matt 10:27 10: 19, 20 Luke 12:3 6:45 John 7: 18 5. WOULD YOU] FEEL COMFORTABLE IF JESUS SHOULD OVERHEAR ALL YOU SAY? 6. WHAT ARE SOME OF THE SINS OF SPEECH? I. Eph. 4:31 1 Peter 21 James 4: 11 Titus 3: 21 Timothy 5:13 THE TEACHING OF JESUS ABOUT PLEASURE IS THERE DANGER IN PLEASURE? Luke 8: 14 2. DID JESUS CONDEMN PLEASURE? John 21, 2 Luke 5: 29 John 12:2 Matt. 9: 11 Luke 13:26 3. WHAT DID JESUS CONDEMN? Matt. 6 19, 23, 25, 28, 31 4, WHAT DID JESUS COMMEND? 5. Matt. 18 1-3 Phil. 213 John 3:17 John &: 29 THE TEACHING OF JESUS ABOUT DUTY I. HOW DID JESUS DEFINE DUTY FOR HIMSELF? 2. 3. Luke 249 John 9:4 Luke 24: 26 HOW DID JESUS DEFINE DUTY FOR US? John 14:15 14:21-24 17:18 ARE THERE MANY DUTIES? John 4: 24 Luke 18: 1 Matt. 23: 23 25 14, 30 John 13: 14 Matt 2537-40 WHAT IS THE IMPULSE TO DUTY? 4. Matt. 22 36-40 John 13:34 5. IS DUTY THE MEASURE OF FAITHFULNESS? Luke 17: 10 |